The Executive Order aimed at ease of Doing business which gave birth to the Visa-on-Arrival have brought about increased visits of foreigners into Nigeria especially investors.
On a monthly basis, foreigners who are desirous of doing business in the country fill the expected visa-on-Arrival form online and granted approval by the Comptroller General of the Nigerian Immigration Service if they meet the requirement of entry into the Nigeria.
The Murtala Mohammed International Airport, Lagos, is one of the ports of entries into the country and a hub for Visa-On-Arrival, VOA.
The VOA is targeted at business investors, people with the sole aim of coming to Nigeria for business purposes.
The Nigeria Immigration Service, NIS, at the airport on a monthly basis record thousands of applications, in the month of July 2019 alone, the service issued 2,194 VOA.
According to an Immigration source who did not want his name mentioned said, the process of applying for the VOA is seamless, “you can log into the NIS website from the comfort of your home, with the improved version, you don’t need a third party”.
“Applicants have nothing to do with our office, when application is granted, the person can travel, the VOA is for 30 days, if the 30 days elapse and he/she want to overstay after the given days, he/she must go to the nearness immigration office to apply for an extension”.
On complaints from some applicants that sometimes their application where not responded to within the 24 hours, an NIS officers observed that applicants often times do not follow the instructions regarding the download of the documents to be filled.
“Some applicants will download only one of the four documents required, some even go to the extent of nothing using their own e-mail addresses, or their frequently used e-mails instead they use the café card, you can imagine, when we respond, the applicants may not know and nobody will tell him/her because they used the wrong channels of receiving responses”.
“Some send in their forms No signature, No authority. We are also in constant touch with airlines to always authenticate these documents”, he added.
According to the source, when the VOA started, there were some hitches which were being addressed, stressing that there were no perfect system, “we have given out special numbers for people to lay such complaints”.
To ensure service delivery in the Ease of Doing Business, the MMIA Immigration Service is focusing on training and retraining of its officials, to this end, it has established training rooms on the E-arrival of the airport terminal to train it officers.
The MMIA NIS has also put surveillance structures in place to nip human trafficking in the bud with the Anti-corruption desk and SERVICOM desk.
“20 participants are trained daily on the need to leave above board; we update them on how to handle issues when they come in line with the Ease of Doing Business”.
